Cao Fei

Okay, now that we’re on the brink of September, New York is coming back to life. And what a life it is—from anarchist spots in Bushwick to mansions in the Bronx, holograms on Governors Island to museums is Astoria—we’ve dug deep to find you the best, weirdest, and most under-represented stuff to do this week across the city.

Tuesday is your last chance to see Cao Fei’s solo show at PS1, and she’s speaking at Pratt that evening. So take a G train jaunt from the museum to the Pratt campus and also catch the closing reception for their Fine Arts MFA thesis exhibition before the talk. Wednesday, get digital u/dys-topian thinking with the surreal architectural images of Dionisio Gonzalez at Galerie Richard and the new Anarcho Tech Collective at The Base. Thursday, Carolina Nitsch Project Room is hosting two projects spanning 50 years of collective Art & Language, and Zak Krevitt’s solo show at Ray Gallery takes viewers inside the world of the “puppy play” fetish.

Friday, the Bartow-Pell Mansion Museum in the Bronx is throwing an opening reception for its centennial garden celbration. The museum has commissioned over a dozen sculptures to respond to sites in its formal gardens. Saturday, head to another overlooked landmark across town: the Governor’s Island Art Fair is bringing work such as Julia Maria Sinelnikova glittery, tech-heavy installations to the historic Colonel’s Row. Then, World Money Gallery is hosting a two-artist salute to Bushwick’s litter (the last line of defense against gentrification?). Finally, spend Sunday unwinding in the serene Noguchi Museum, but don’t worry about spending money—it’s a free admission “Community Day.”

There’s finally no excuse to be bored this week. It’s a big city out there. Go explore!

For years, people who make proclamations about “something being the new something” have said “Brooklyn is the new Manhattan.” Apparently that means it’s now also totally boring in August? New York’s two most over-exposed boroughs are having a slow week, with just a smattering of art events (but we are thrilled Vector Gallery is making a triumphant return to Manhattan Thursday night.) Brooklyn has a Wednesday night performance at The Park Church Co-op and a screening of the 1977 feminist classic Riddles of the Sphinx to look forward to Thursday, but really it’s the rest of Long Island that sees the most action.

LIC will be art-star-studded Thursday night for MoMA PS1’s Night At the Museum closing party. Then, the party moves out to Fire Island for BOFFO’s performance festival. All weekend, look forward to genre-bending work across the swirly disciplines of drag, dance, music, and fashion from artists such as FLUCT, SSION, M. Lamar, Pearl, and more. Seriously, we can’t recommend a trip to the beach more—there’s practically nothing to do in the city’s art scene this weekend and the Fire Island fest looks like it’s going to go be remembered as a total “had to be there”.

Spring is in the New York air, and with it, a sense of fantastical possibility. Tuesday, head to BRIC to hear from powerful women in the music industry who overcame the glass ceiling to live the dream. Wednesday, Simone Subal Gallery has a show of reality-warping paintings and Thursday the New Museum is hosting a panel discussion with artists who try to do it all. Friday night, Nic Rad’s solo show at Victori + Mo imagines an art-historical alter ego to combat zombie formalism with Ab-Ex passion and millennial pop references. At Bannerette, Ash Ferlito and Clare Torina explore the potentials of oil and other media in a playful two person show. End the night drinking maybe-imaginary beer at Brooklyn’s ALL WHITE MALE ART SHOW (don’t worry, that name’s just a fantasy too).

But the weekend is where things get really surreal: Saturday is an all-day virtual reality team hackathon that invites visitors to construct their own immersive dreamscapes using a high-tech installation at Storefront for Art and Architecture. Sunday, Cao Fei gets her first museum show in the US at MoMA PS1. Expect photos of live-action-roleplaying Chinese anime fans (abvove) and narratives from her Second Life avatar.

A then and now of Vermeer’s Little Street. Credit: Rijksmuseum/The Art Newspaper

The original location of Vermeer’s “The Little Street” has been discovered. After a century of debate among scholars as to whether one of the earliest Northern European portraits of a middle class house exterior was real or fictitious, the buildings have been determined to be Trip Gate in Delft. [The Art Newspaper]

Silicon Valley has their over-valuated “unicorn” start-ups, and now Canada has their own name for those $1 billion plus tech companies: narwhals. How the arctic toothed whale embodies our pre-tech bubble burst no one knows—maybe when it all sinks, Canadian start-ups are able to break the ice with their tusk, constant apologizing, and self-deprecating humor. [Quartz]

In related news, a millennial Silicon Valley unicorn founder has let the world know he does not want cars, watches or gadgets: he wants to start collecting art, and has appropriately inspired a Twitter parody account of his potential art collection with quips like “it’s time to #swiperight on the #artworld.” [artnet news]

This confessional listicle from a recently out of work, 25 year independent video store employee is depressing. With the demise of the video store industry, here’s what we’re losing despite the convenience of Netflix: human interaction and a video library not solely shaped by the whims of licensing agreements. [Vox]

Holland Cotter thinks the Martin Wong retrospective survey at the Bronx Museum of the Arts is a must-see. He fondly reminisces about first encountering the “virtuoso realist” in the 1980s when he was briefly a clerk in the Met’s bookstore, and the critical eye he brought to his mystical city paintings. [New York Times]

Artist assistant: “John, BMW’s publicist needs a quote from you for the press release announcing the Art Car commission.” Baldessari: “Is this really necessary right now? I’m in the middle of something.” Assistant: “Cao Fei hasn’t gotten back to them yet.” Baldessari: “I really don’t care, just tell something corny about how it’ll be my ‘fastest artwork yet’.” [Autoblog]

London’s National Portrait Gallery just scored a $4.5 million donation from the Lucian Freud estate containing his letters, sketchbooks and early childhood drawings. [Artforum]

David Bowie has a new music video. There’s a sax solo and bandaged eyes and dancers moving with seizure-like movements and creepy kids. [The Awl]

If you live in Berlin, you really have no excuse to be late ever again if you’re travelling via transit, especially since their transit authority has released a real-time map of their subway system. [Metafilter]

As a testament to how bad Chelsea has gotten lately, artists Jen Catron and Paul Outlaw are currently running a successful souvenir business solely of items making fun of celebrity-obsessed curators and James Franco. Things are bleak, but we’ve at least managed to find a few events that continue to make our jobs worth doing.

Political debate continues to be moronic. Last week, the hosts of a web show called “PolitiChicks” appeared on Fox and Friends to encourage women to free themselves from the shackles of old feminism. Old feminism did little more than sexualize women, whereas this new feminism, they claim, allows women to be feminine. As God intended. Apparently that means “less government in their lives” and the love of “real men.” Most of what gets said makes little to no sense. [Talking Points Memo]

Another critic praises the Carl Andre show at DIA: Beacon. This happens to be exceptional because Andre has been “relatively undersung” and his entire output has been “repressed in American museums.” Compared to Donald Judd, maybe, but most other artists? Nah. [Artforum]

In 1988 German musician Holger Hiller produced different sounds from every item in a room, and collaged them together to make the song Ohi Ho Bang Bang. This is the video. [YouTube]

Cao Fei’s latest film “La Town” channels film noir, Mattel toys, Tim Burton, and features a Santa Claus with a full set of reindeer. Watch the trailer: it looks bizarrely splendid. [Lombard Freid]

Entering Lombard-Freid Projects, I saw something that gave a generational thrill: an exquisitely equipped eight-by-four-foot fingerboard skatepark. Eight boards, arranged in a neat line, called out. Being a good journalist, I made my way to the desk to ask a hard-hitting question: “Can I play?”